why occupy? creating collective identity and commitment in occupations

7/29/2019 Why Occupy? Creating Collective Identity and Commitment in Occupations

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Owen Grooms

Jeff KeithCapstone

3/19/12

Student ID Number- 185999

Why Occupy?: The Creation of Collective Identity and Commitment in the BrazilianLandless Workers and Occupy Movements

Abstract

This paper explores the practice of physical occupation within two social movements, the

Landless Workers Movement (MST) of Brazil and the Occupy movement, in order to

understand how contemporary social movements use occupation as a strategy forpromoting group cohesion and activist commitment. Using interviews with members of

both movements and writings by movement participants, this essay analyzes, compares,and contrasts various participants views and several secondary sources regarding the roleof occupation in their respective movements. Their insights also speak to emergent trends

in the secondary literature on social movement theory. While the MST and Occupy

movements use occupation primarily to highlight social inequalities and to compel elites

to change, this essay argues that their occupations also create opportunities for tangibleengagement and community formation in ways that promote collective identity and a

shared sense of commitment. This work has implications for anyone seeking to

understand the many social movements that are using occupation to alter thecontemporary global power structure.

Introduction

Social movements have used occupation as a tool for social change in many

contexts, times, and places. In 1964 and 1969 the American Indian Movement occupied

the island of Alcatraz, and in 1973, the Ogala Sioux Nation famously occupied the town

of Wounded Knee, South Dakota.1

These occupations sparked greater involvement in the

American Indian Movement, making it a force to be reckoned with.2

Recently, the

occupation of Tahrir Square in Cairo was instrumental in bringing down the regime of

1Malcolm, Andrew. Occupation of Wounded Knee Is Ended."New York Times, May 9,1973.2Johnson, Troy. The Occupation of Alcatraz Island: Roots of American Indian

Activism. Wicazo Sa Review 10, no. 2 (October 1, 1994): 6379.


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Hosni Mubarak. TheIndignado movement in Spain put immense pressure on its Socialist

government and the entire political system, helping to bring about a political transition.

Several years ago, residents of Buenos Aires, Argentina occupied their suburb to protest

a serious lack of housing and land that is evident throughout the country and began

building a new community there.3

With these as only a few examples, I assert that social

movements use occupation primarily to bring attention to social justice issues and force

those with power to agree to demands,4

while other occupations also take over productive

capital or land and put it into the hands of the people.

One social movement that exemplifies both uses of occupations is the Landless

Workers Movement of Brazil (MST), which, since 1984, has worked with families to

occupy and redistribute unused or unproductive farmland owned by large landowners.5

More recently, the Occupy Wall Street Movement has exemplified the first method by

creating physical occupations across the United States and other industrializing countries

to draw attention to social inequalities and pressure those with power to change. Both the

MST and Occupy have remained resilient and have continued to grow, even though they

often face hardships and are provoked by elites. City governments across the United

States have shut occupations down, and at least one author has written that the MST is

using occupation less. Occupation, however, is central to what both movements have

been and are. How are these movements able to keep participants involved even though

the demands of physical occupations are great? Physical occupations provide both the

3

Kavanagh, Shane. Argentina: A Different Kind of Land Occupation

http://upsidedownworld.org/main/argentina-archives-32/1294-argentina-a-

different-kind-of-land-occupation4

See also Civil Rights Sit-ins5

Carter, Miguel. The Landless Rural Workers Movement (MST) and Democracy in

Brazil.Latin American Research Review. 194-5.


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Occupy Wall Street Movement and the Brazilian Landless Workers Movement with

opportunities for member participation and inclusivity, which combine to help create a

sense of collective identity so that individuals develop the commitment to drive the

movement forward.

In the field of social movement studies, there are some works on how the physical

occupation of space contributes to movement goals, with one notable article by Guy

Aitchison entitled, Reform, Rupture or Re-imagination: Understanding the Purpose of

an Occupation. Aitchison argues that occupations should serve as a space both to live

out the ideological ideals of the movements, and a space to focus on and live protest

collectively. While other works describe occupations, these are not informed by social

movement theory. For example, Troy Johnsons The Occupation of Alcatraz Island,

describes the history and success of the occupation in furthering the American Indian

movement, but it did not focus on the details of life in the encampment and its connection

to key terms such as commitment or collective identity.6

Additionally, while authors John

Krinsky and Ellen Reese do not discuss occupation, they do compare social movements

in three different cities and their ability to sustain themselves through collective identity

and increased commitment.7

Though there are works on occupation in general and social

movement pragmatism creating sustainable movements through collective identity and

commitment, there are no articles that discuss the two concepts together, which is what

this paper accomplishes. Additionally, because of the movements novelty, there are no

6

Johnson, Troy. The Occupation of Alcatraz Island: Roots of American Indian

Activism. Wicazo Sa Review 10, no. 2 (October 1, 1994): 6379.7

Krinsky, John, and Ellen Reese. Forging and Sustaining Labor-Community Coalitions:The Workfare Justice Movement in Three Cities. Sociological Forum 21, no. 4

(December 2006): 623658.


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secondary sources aside from a blog entry entitled Spatiality in Occupy Wall Street,

that discuss the effectiveness of occupation in obtaining movement goals within the

Occupy Movement. There is also little literature that analyzes and compares the actual

processes of occupation and its effects within different social movements.

Thus, this paper aims to contribute to several gaps in the scholarly understanding

regarding the importance of place in the creation of collective identity, movement

solidarity, commitment to occupations, and how social movements use occupation to

achieve movement goals. I am seeking to compare the processes and purposes of

occupation among the well-documented Landless Workers Movement of Brazil with the

novel Occupy movement. In order to understand the process of occupation as a whole

and within these two radically different movements, this essay examines how physical

occupations are integral to the continuation of both social movements and explores how

occupation performs a role in creating a committed base of activists that have a strong

sense of collective identity.

With the massive surge in occupation movements initiated with the Arab Spring

that has spread throughout the world, it is important to understand these movements in

context and in more detail. How does occupation empower people and movements? If we

understand this question, we will be more likely to understand why these movements

have become such powerful forces in contemporary world affairs, what their possible

future trajectory might be, and how their impact might affect us as individuals. As global

power structures change, it is important to understand social dynamics that are beginning

to shift previous balances of power. These social movements are becoming more

important to our lives as they gain power and seek to achieve social justice in a broader,


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societal and global context. In order to achieve social justice in this way, the MST and

Occupy both have utilized occupation, which creates a sense of solidarity and collective

identity among movement participants. More fully understanding how these movements

use occupation to fulfill their goals will help all of us understand these and other social

movements more fully.

Physical occupation is important to both the MST and the global Occupy

Movement in that it helps create a sense of collective identity and also a heightened level

of commitment. Clearly, this ideal is not achieved in all movements which employ the

tactic of physical occupation, but the physical presence and grouping together of people

is central to the formation of collective identity that is necessary for movements to

achieve social change and obtain high levels of commitment and member participation.

In understanding the source of increased commitment, readers must first understand why

and how people have come together under the banner of these social movements.

Background

In Brazil, land ownership is of upmost importance to everyone who attempts to

make a living in the countryside. The MST and other peasant organizations are especially

concerned with land, as Brazil has the second-highest concentration of land ownership in

the world. This has deep historical roots in slavery and the massivesesmaria land grants

given by the Portuguese crown to its subjects in an attempt to control and settle the

massive country during colonization.8

As the planter class developed through the

8Wright, Angus Lindsay, and Wendy Wolford. To Inherit the Earth: The Landless

Movement and the Struggle for a New Brazil. Food First Books, 2003.


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expansion of slavery, land ownership continued to be concentrated in the hands of the

few. In 1956 3% of the people owned 50% of the land in the most impoverished region of

Brazil, the Northeast.9

As a response to similar nationwide inequality, the MST arose in

the late 1970s in the more progressive southern region of Brazil where landless peasants

began to organize and occupy large farms in the hope of redistributing them. The

movement gained crucial support from church organizations such as the Pastoral Land

Commission of the Catholic Church (CPT), a manifestation of liberation theology,

wherein priests across Latin America organized people around social justice issues. The

MST staged its first occupations during the military dictatorship era and spread across the

country during the 1980s in order to pressure the government that began to include land

reform in its agenda during democratization.10

Even after decades of occupation and

government lip service to the issue, however, the inequality of land ownership today is

worse than it was in the 1950s: 1.6% of landowners now control 47% of farmland, and

the poorest third controls 1.6% of all arable land in Brazil.11

Why has the concentration of land ownership become more pronounced after

democratization? American University Professor Miguel Carter notes that the newly

democratic Brazilian government modernized the agricultural system and participated in

trade liberalization, which in turn gave rise to a powerful triple alliance of the national

landed elite, the state, and global agro-food corporations, which cemented the power of

9 Barnard, Clift. Imperialism, Underdevelopment and Education, inLiteracy andRevolution: The Pedagogy of Paulo Freire, ed. Robert Mackie (New York: Continuum,

1984), 19.

10Martins, Monica Dias. The MST Challenge to Neoliberalism.Latin AmericanPerspectives 27, no. 5 (2000): 3345.

11Carter, Miguel. The Landless Rural Workers Movement (MST) and Democracy in

Brazil. Latin American Research Review. 189.


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the elite and the oppression of the rural poor of Brazil.12

As Angus Wright and Wendy

Wolford note, the government spurred on investment by large syndicates, which in turn

bought up mammoth plots of land, produced surpluses that drastically reduced prices, and

in turn drove masses of small farmers off of their land.13

During democratization, the

landed elite maintained their power by becoming the largest voting bloc in the Brazilian

Congress, which continues to slow attempts at land reform today.14

Because the landed

elite wields so much power, the Brazilian government is reluctant to engage in any sort of

land reform, even that which it has promised. Written in the 1988 Brazilian Constitution

is a clause that necessitates the redistribution of land that is ill used or not used at all by

the owner, who is usually a latifundista, or large landowner.15

The MST occupies these

large farms in order to force the Brazilian Government to redistribute it to the poor. In

each occupation, the MST seeks out an eligible site for expropriation, recruits between

200 and 2,500 families, and educates and trains them for the effort, which attracts the

attention of INCRA, the Brazilian land reform agency.16

After a quarter century of activism, the MST has redistributed over 20 million acres

of agricultural land to over 350,000 families.17

With more than one million people

operating in 23 of 27 Brazilian states, and support from 20,000 activists ormilitantes, the

12

Ibid, 190.

13Wright, Angus Lindsay, and Wendy Wolford. To Inherit the Earth: The Landless

Movement and the Struggle for a New Brazil. Food First Books, 2003, xv.14

Carter, Miguel. The MST and Democracy, 191.15

See Brazilian Land Law.

http://www.planalto.gov.br/publi_04/COLECAO/REFAGR3.HTM#216

Hammond, John L. The MST and the Media: Competing Images of the BrazilianLandless Farmworkers Movement. Latin American Politics and Society 46, no.

4 (December 1, 2004): 69.17Wright, Angus Lindsay, and Wendy Wolford. To Inherit. xiii.


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MST is said to be the most important social movement in Latin America.18

It is able to

sustain itself and grow through the process of occupation wherein landless people create

a meager living in black tarps on the unused farmland they hope to use. With fairly

autonomous occupations springing up across the nation and eventually becoming

settlements, there is a complex and scattered network of collective groups and regional

variation and experimentation of tactics. The movement also uses thirteen large task

teams and some central governance in So Paulo that organizes the mass protests on the

capital and other nationwide initiatives the MST engages in, such as ending the usage of

pesticides in Brazil.

The Occupy movement rose more recently than the MST, and is rooted in other

more recent protest and occupation movements from across the globe. Kalle Lasn, who

writes for the Canadian-based magazineAdbusters, noted that the US needs its own

Tahrir, and first came up with the idea of an encampment in New York City, its start

date, and its name: Occupy Wall Street. Lasn and his partner White also created the first

website for the movement, which says that movement is inspired by popular uprisings in

Egypt and Tunisia.19

Unlike these Arab Spring Movements, which used occupation to

topple dictators, the Occupy movements targets are less clearly defined. The movement

claims that it is fighting against the richest 1% of people and the corrosive power of

major banks and multinational corporations over the democratic process.20

While the

18Carter, Miguel . The MST and Democracy, 187, 199.

19Schwartz, Mattathias. Pre-Occupied: The Origins and Future of Occupy Wall Street,The New Yorker, November, 28, 2011,http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/11/28/111128fa_fact_schwartz

20SeetheOccupy Wall Street Website. http://occupywallst.org/about/.


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Occupy movement cannot base its pressure around individuals as the protests of the Arab

Spring could, all of these movements are fighting gross inequalities through the process

of occupation. Marina Sitrin and Luis Moreno-Caballud, two activists with both the

SpanishIndignado and Occupy Movements, note that Egyptian and Greek protest

movements sparked both their Iberian and American counterparts, and that all four of

these movements occupy public space.

In addition to the process of occupation, the Occupy movement drew on a culture

of acceptance and openness that these predecessor movements also utilized. Therefore,

these occupations quickly turned to the construction of miniature models of the society

that the movement wanted to create, according to Sitrin and Moreno-Caballud.Themovement has been using general assemblies, consensus processing, and physical

occupations all over the United States and other post-industrial states to attract members,

draw attention to issues, force those with power to change, and provide access to truly

representative politics. The general assemblies provided this public forum where

everyone is free to voice their opinions or concerns.21

Additionally, like the MST,

Occupy has also recently worked to establish a working group organizational system,

which forms teams of specialized people that work on specific issues within and outside

of the occupations. According to Sitrin and Moreno-Caballud, the Occupy Movement is

beginning to gradually shift from acts of protest to creating the real change these

movements want realized in society as a whole. In effect, as the Spanish Indignado

movement has already done, the Occupy movement is going beyond the encampments

21LuisMorenoCaballudandMarinaSitrin,OccupyWallStreet,Beyond

Encampments,Yes!,November21,2011,http://www.yesmagazine.org/people

power/occupywallstreetbeyondencampments


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and interacting with other communities as occupations continue to be important as an

ever more inclusive, community-centered and collective place. This process brings the

ideals of the encampments to a broader world.While the Occupy movement is mainly concerned with reforming the financial

system and changing the role business plays in politics, it is also concerned with myriad

other systemic problems, and it aims to achieve social equality for everyone on a grand

scale.22

Similarly, while the MST is concerned about land reform issues, these are

connected with many aspects of social inequality and thus the MST has expanded its

mission to fighting for a more just Brazilian society in general. While the MST is

concerned that 1% of land is in the hands of 45% of the people, the Occupy movement is

concerned that 40% of the total wealth of the United States is held by the richest 1%.23

This is evident when it states its three main objectives on its website: to fight for land,

agrarian reform, and a more just and brotherly society.24

While several authors argue that occupations are important, but not necessarily

needed in both movements, both movements use occupation to drive the energy of their

movement, provide community, and help to form a collective identity. Both movements

use smaller groups to achieve issues committees in the MST and working groups

in Occupy. Additionally, both are intentionally democratic institutions. While the Occupy

movement uses consensus processing, the MST has a democratically elected executive

committee that makes big decisions. Both have general assemblies, though with the

MST, because of the massive scale, is a representative body of all settlements and

22

See: http://www.nycga.net/resources/declaration/23

Why We Occupy: The Declaration of Occupy D.C. YES! Magazine, December 7,

2011, http://www.yesmagazine.org/people-power/declaration-of-occupy-d.c.24

See: http://www.mstbrazil.org/content/objectives-mst


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encampments within the movement, while each encampment within Occupy answers

only to itself. Before delving into these processes, we must first understand that the initial

and often main purpose of many occupation movements is to attract attention to issues,

and that the MST and Occupy similarly use occupation as their main tool to bring the

inequalities they seek to address to the attention of politicians, the media, and the public.

Methodology

I based my research in social movement theory, notably in theBlackwell

Companion to Social Movements, and Collective Identity and Social Movements which

served as a theoretical basis for much of my research. I conducted nine interviews with

seven individuals by email, in person, and over the phone. I also used field experience in

Brazil to provide a more complete view of the MST. I used various secondary sources in

order to complete my view of both movements, especially in terms of the MST, while I

also used primary sources, mostly websites, to more clearly understand the two

movements and their usage of occupation as well.

Literature Review

I am basing my research in social movement theory that addresses commitment,

collective identity, and participation. While the literature on this topic abounds, this paper

is only beginning to fill a void in scholarship on the pragmatism of social movements in

relation to key needs such as commitment and collective identity. My paper will add to

Aitchisons unique work by addressing occupation within specific social movements.


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By analyzing a student movement in the UK, Aitchison defines three modes of

occupation, based on Erik Olin Wrights Envisioning in Real Utopias, which defines

three strategies for social change. The first form, which he labels symbiotic, involves

debate and dialogue with power holders and demands given to them. The second form,

the ruptural stage, is where the group realizes that dialogue is ineffective and

intentionally breaks off and becomes more radical. Aitchison demonstrates the

development of this stage by discussing how individuals within occupations reinforce one

anothers opinions, identities harden and opposition becomes more entrenched in the

individual.

25

The third, or interstitial phase, involves the deliberate creation of another

type of society, in this example, of radical democracy. In his conclusion, Aitchison finds

that the process of forming a democratic practice within the occupation, the process,

cannot be separated from what movements seek to achieve outside, the protest aspect.

He concludes that occupations are successful only when they include a wide range of

people, strategies, and processes.26

Saskia Sassen has also written several articles about what occupation does in

terms of territory and space. In Occupying is Not the Same as Demonstrating, she

writes that occupation remake[s], even if temporarily, territorys embedded and often

deeply undemocratic logics of power. For her, the city is a place where powerless can

change the narrative of history and claim a voice and citizenship because of the social

dynamics inherent in the urban street.27

In the Global Street, Sassen declares that

urban space makes [protestors] powerlessness complex, and in that complexity lies the

25

Ibid, 435.26

Ibid, 439.

27Sassen, Saskia and Haacke, Hans. Occupying is Not the Same as Demonstrating.

http://socialetymologies.com/?p=465


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possibility of making the political, making the civic. In these two articles, she declares

that the Occupy Movement, like protestors in Tahrir Square, has shown how important

claiming physical space is for the powerless, and that by forming an encampment and

keeping it peaceful, these movements have transformed the space they take into another

type of territory, that which can remake social and political processes to include the

powerless. Sassen says they are engaged in the work of citizenship, exposing deep flaws

and wrongs in their polity and society. She writes that the powerless can make history

without taking power. She is one of the few authors to discuss occupation providing

certain social movement building blocks such as empowerment, even if she does it

without directly referencing social movement theory.28

Two key secondary sources seek to directly address issues such as collective

identity, commitment and solidarity and give me the vocabulary and framework with

which to engage these issues. In Collective Identity and Social Movements, Polleta and

Jasper seek to understand why collective identity emerges, how it impacts personal

motivation, and how it affects movement choices. In the conclusion, the authors note that

there is a gap in understanding the importance of place in the creation of collective

identity. They claim that collective identity is an individuals cognitive, moral, and

emotional connection with a broader community, category, practice, or institution. They

note that it is a perception, and thus that it is not necessarily a concrete experience, but

can be imagined.29

28

Sassen, Saskia. The Global Street: Making the Political, Globalizations 8, no. 5(October 2011): 56571

29Francesca Polletta and James M. Jasper, Collective Identity and Social Movements,Annual Review of Sociology 27, no. 1 (2001): 283.


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In theBlackwell Companion to Social Movements, collective identity is seen as a

key ingredient of, and result of collective action by movements.30

Occupations are

critically important to this work of collective identity, as they fix a movement in space,

which is central to the construction and maintenance of social movement organization

actors collective and personal identities.31

If collective identities are more important for

occupation movements, what then, does this collective identity do for the two movements

in question? Typically, in social movements, collective identity increases both solidarity

for others in the movement and increased commitment to the movement. According to

Hunt and Benford, solidarity requires the identification of a collective entity and

participants identification with a body of affiliated actors. Similarly, social movements

must tie what they do to the basic nature of those from whom they seek commitment.

Thus, who individuals are and what they desire must be in general what the movement is

and seeks. As Hunt and Benford posit, commitment can only be seems as an individuals

identification with a collectivity that leads to instrumental, affective, and moral

attachments that lead to investments in movement lines of activity.32

Clearly, collective

identity is necessary in social movement development as Gamson states: any movement

that seeks to sustain commitment over a long period of time must make the construction

of collective identity one of its most central tasks.33

30

David A. Snow, Sarah Anne Soule, and Hanspeter Kriesi, The Blackwell Companion to

Social Movements (Wiley-Blackwell, 2004). 433.31

Ibid. 443.32

Ibid. 442.

33Gamson, William A. Commitment and Agency in Social Movements. SociologicalForum 6, no. 1 (March 1991): 27.


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In terms of the actual creation of collective identity, Hunt and Benford regard

participation, regarded as micromobilization, as important. Hunt and Benford do not,

however, focus on the concepts of inclusivity and community that this paper does. The

authors instead focus on the role of boundary framing in the creation of collective

identity. Boundary framing uses force by oppositional outsiders as a legitimizing force

for highlighting differences between the social movement actors and those they position

themselves against. This helps to construct a more defined and nuanced identity with

which participants understand in a more defined way who they are not, and see

themselves as having a collective self.

34

Overall, the literature notes that movements create collective identity through

participation and boundary framing to help create clear lines of identity. Social

movements also create collective identity and commitment through other concepts, as this

paper demonstrates. Before readers seek to understand the usage and production of

collective identity, we must first understand how occupations fulfill their first goal, which

is to bring attention to social justice issues.

Presence

As the Introduction to this paper argues, one main goal of occupation is to bring

attention to social justice issues and force those with power to ameliorate these issues. In

this context, Aitchison would deem Occupy to be a symbiotic occupation where

occupiers make demands of and have dialogue with the power structure. Demanding

change from those with power is the goal of many social movements, and those that

34

Ibid. 442-4.


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ascribe to this goal have several other means to achieve it, such as demonstration and

protest. As Sassen implies, however, demonstrations cannot fulfill the same role as

occupations, and cannot provide as much change, because they are ephemeral.35

Occupations, on the other hand, have long-lasting impacts on peoples minds, both within

and outside of the movement, which demonstrations might not be able to have. John

Spitzberg, a participant in Occupy Asheville, notes that the main purpose of the Occupy

Movement is to take a place, to effectively demonstrate to others the negative changes

in American society that they perceive.36

William Ott, a member of Occupy Birmingham,

compares this presence with the Civil Rights sit-ins that not only attracted attention, but

also created a slight disruption in the public sphere. Ott suggests that occupations allow

the movement to show its face and allow for a concrete and constant presence in larger

communities that is also personal. This constant presence not only informs and

potentially involves other individuals in the movement, but it also more effectively sends

a message to power holders.

In this vein, Allyn Hudson of Occupy Birmingham believes the most important part

of the Occupy Movement is that it is a constant presence in the face of those elites that

are causing inequality. He states that marches can soon be forgotten, but an occupation

stays in the mind and continues to strike fear in the hearts of those who oppose us.37

Yautom also agrees with this sentiment, saying the main object for the occupations is to

put pressure on powers that be to change.38

35

Sassen, Saskia and Haacke, Hans. Occupying is Not the Same as Demonstrating.


Ibid.37

Allyn Hudson, interview by author, Birmingham, AL, January 12, 2012.

38Yotam Sawyer. Interview by author, Swannanoa, NC, March 17, 2012.


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The MST also performs occupations largely to attract attention and compel change.

For the MST, occupation is the direct action that forces the Brazilian land reform agency,

INCRA, to redistribute land. As Hammond notes, the occupying presence is crucial to

asserting the moral force of their demand to have a particular property expropriated.39

Without this moral force which demands attention, land reform would not occur.

According to Joo Pedro Stedile, and MST leader states, our goal is to do mass actions

to create pressure for concrete measures to resolve the problems.40

While Caldeira has

noted that the MSTs struggle for land is increasingly moving from the pasture to the

courtroom, she states, ultimately, the court battle can only be won if the battle outside

continues to take place.41

Hammond also notes that the cohesion of the occupation

during litigation is an essential task in ensuring success. In addition, the movements

land occupations have historically drawn media attention to the plight of the landless, and

the MST seeks to use this to motivate militants and to broadcast its accomplishments to

the public.42

Clearly, both of these movements use the action of physical occupation create a

strong presence and conjure a moral force to compel those with power to change

inequalities. What more, then, do occupations provide for these two movements? As the

Literature Review describes, the levels of commitment and collective identity in social

39Hammond, John L. The MST and the Media: Competing Images of the Brazilian

Landless Farmworkers Movement. Latin American Politics and Society, 46, no. 4(December 1, 2004): 69.40Ibid,72.

41Caldeira, Rute. Up-dating Its Strategies and Amplifying Its Frames: The Landless

Rural Workers Movement in Brazil and the Displacement of the Struggle for Land.

Perspectives on Global Development and Technology, 7, no. 2 (June 2008): 145.

42Hammond, MST and Media, 61, 72.


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movements are very important. These two movements maintain commitment and

collective identity and thus energy and power through occupation. How then do the

physical occupations create collective identities, as well as solidarity and commitment,

for these social movements? To answer this question, readers must understand how

physical occupations bring people into the movement and allow for direct participation

from many individuals.

Participation and Inclusivity

Clearly, as much as social movements need to influence those with power, they

also need people working to complete their desired goals. High levels of participation

bring energy to the movement as a whole, but it also works to empower individuals

within the movement. As Gamson notes, [s]ocial relationships that embody values of

participation and community in their concrete practices contribute to empowering

people.43

As participation drives empowerment at an individual level and sustained

momentum at the movement level, inclusivity becomes crucial to the success of both the

MST and Occupy movements as it drives higher levels of participation.

In occupations in general, high levels of engagement and participation are needed

at all times for it to be successful. Everyone involved plays an integral role in the

movement, and as Yotam Sawyer, an activist who had experiences in three physical

occupations, Occupy Wall Street in New York City, Occupy DC, and Occupy Asheville

notes, if someone does not participate [in the occupation], their absence is noticed.44

To

Allyn, the necessity of the involvement of everyone is a crucial aspect to the movement.

43

Gamson. Commitment and Agency, 1991. 28.

44Yotam Sawyer. Interview by author, Swannanoa, NC, March 17, 2012.


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He argues that, everyone has a role in the movement and is an integral part of greater

success. He argues that everyone has skin in the game within occupations, since they

have a needed, defined role and are achieving something important with others. If

everyone does not come together and work as a group, the occupation cannot be

successful, he says. Like Gamson, he notes that acting in a collective like this allows for a

rare chance to feel empowerment.45

The myriad constant needs of a physical occupation,

such as maintaining food distribution and medical attention, assure this, while decision-

making does as well. The occupations use consensus processing through General

Assemblies to allow for participation form everyone. Everyones concrete actions and

thoughts contribute to the wellbeing of everyone else and, thus, the continued success of

the movement. As individuals see themselves as an integral part of a whole, collective

identity is created, while they also increasingly see their work as crucial, commitment is

formed.

Within the MST, participation within occupations is just as crucial. Together,

MST occupiers cook, set up tents, organize and go to literacy classes, and protect the

encampment. Occupiers and militants quickly organize women and young adult

collectives.46

The encampments organize different teams to look at all relevant issues.

These teams, better referred to as nucleos de base or core foundations are created

during the occupation to provide the basis for the organizational structure of life after the

land is won. These tightly-knit groups of about twelve families help to provide not only

for effective avenues of participation, but also community togetherness and a sense of

45

Ibid.46

Branford, Sue and Jan Rocha. Cutting the Wire: The Landless Movement of Brazil in

We are Everywhere, edited by Notes from Nowhere, 132.


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collective identity at a smaller scale. Not only are all included in making the encampment

work in general, it is governed this way as well. Kane notes that the MST occupations

provide people with participatory democracy skills, as everyone is involved in the

governance structure.47

To the MST, land occupations are the lifeblood of the movement, because they

bring in landless people to become new and active members. Oziel describes the aspect

of base work in which older MST participants seek new movement members by

traveling to at risk urban communities and demonstrating the positive aspects of rural life.

These individuals bring others into the movement because they had success, they believe

others can and should as well, and because they are committed to the ideals of the

movement, he said.Occupations, he says, put into action peoples rights and show a new

way to see the world and politics. Thus, the people involve themselves more and want

to transmit this involvement to other people so that these others can also achieve the

realization of their rights.48

The MST recruits new members from large shantytowns that

are removed from rural life, as well as from areas close to the plantations they seek to

occupy.49

In general, those that become involved with the MST are some of the poorest

of Brazilian society, and thus, they know that their participation within the movement,

along with that of others, is the only thing that can ensure their livelihood. This

aggressive search for future occupiers ensures that future encampments will have enough

47Kane, Liam. Popular Education and the Landless Peoples Movement in Brazil(MST). Studies in the Education of Adults 32, no. 1 (April 2000):

48Oziel Fernando, email message to author, February 24, 2012.49Branford, Sue and Jan Rocha. Cutting the Wire: The Landless Movement of Brazilin We are Everywhere, edited by Notes from Nowhere, 122-133. New York: Verso, 2003.


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participants to be effective. Here, participation of long-time members drives the inclusion

of new members and provides for the sustained growth of the movement.

William of Occupy Birmingham says that people come to participate because the

physical occupation allows for concrete action with the support of others.50

Similarly,

Alicia of Occupy Eugene responded that people become involved because they know

they are not alone and that whether the space lives or dies, the people know it's possible

to create something else.51

Thus, occupations inspire people to create a different world

and provide a way to engage in a concrete way to achieve social change. As Saskia

Sassen states, occupations make novel territory, and thereby a bit of history. Rather

than just informing the populous, she argues that occupation remakes territorys

embedded and often deeply undemocratic logics of power, and redefine[s] the role of

citizens.52

Accordingly, John Spitzberg, who is involved in Occupy Asheville, states that

the physical occupation is an effective way for people to begin to, if symbolically, take

back land and wealth that was stolen from them by elites. The power behind creating

alternatives clearly drives people to participate in the Occupy Movement.

While this desire for concrete action in creating a new world may compel people

to participate, the Occupy Movement also actively seeks to bring in a large, diverse group

of people to work in the movement. For this, and other movements, inclusivity is an

important part of allowing for complete participation. Allyn Hudson notes that

progressive stack, a tool used in the General Assemblies to include groups that are

often silenced by society, actively gives preference to minorities and women in the

50

William Ott. Interview by author, Birmingham, AL, January 6, 2012.

51Alicia, email message to author, March 2, 2012.

52Sassen, Saskia and Haacke, Hans. Occupying is Not the Same as Demonstrating.



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bodys discussions.53

This helps to ensure that everyones voice is heard and decisions

are made by consensus in the General Assemblies. This leads to increased participation

and empowerment, as individuals feel they can actively become a part of democracy,

according to Allyn.54

Inclusivity is also an important aspect in the Occupy movement in regards to the

homeless populations that so many occupations have embraced. John Spitzberg notes that

the homeless population came in to the occupations as squatters, who were also frequent

users of drugs and alcohol, in need of shelter and care. However, because of their

exposure to practices like consensus processing through staying at the occupation, they

developed a sense of unity with the occupiers who had other places to stay. Spitzberg

noted that many of the homeless individuals who became involved with Occupy

Asheville were able to effectively engage in the movement and were able to give up some

of their addictive habits. Because they were welcomed into the movement through the

physical occupation, many of the homeless population became more aware of certain

issues, and several even became leaders in the Occupy community.

Spitzberg noted that it was with their acceptance into a caring environment and as

individuals that the homeless population was able to raise their self-esteem to a point

where they could become integral members of the movement. While there were

sporadically problems, he noted that one could rarely tell the difference between the

movement-oriented people, usually younger and often students, and the homeless after

this unity was established. Only after this intentional acceptance could the movement

represent more of society and have all individuals come together as one. This aspect of

53Allyn Hudson, email message to author, February 25, 201254Allyn Hudson, interview by author, Birmingham, AL, January 12, 2012.


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incorporating all people into the movement is especially important to Kayvon, an

Asheville-based activist who also participated in occupations in Zuccotti park and

Washington DC. He similarly believes that unity only comes through inclusivity. He

states, until we are all doing what we can to end the suffering around us, there won't be

the unity necessary to make an impact. Thus, when all are welcomed to participate,

occupations have been shown to promote a great deal of unity among all involved, and

thus, a collective identity can form. Collective identity can only by formed when those

within the movement treat everyone equally, and this can be effective only when

everyone that can be is intentionally brought into the movement.

Physical occupations offer several different ways for individuals to become

involved and help build the movement. Allyn Hudson, a member and lead organizer of

Occupy Birmingham, discussed how an individual was able to achieve real change by

interacting with the physical occupation. Because he saw the occupation and was

interested, the Imam of Birminghams Muslim community stopped by the occupation

outside of Regions Bank in the heart of the financial district. He discussed the

movements goals with the individuals present, and then informed the movement of a

couple, the Wards, that he knew who were in dire need of assistance. Bank of America

was foreclosing on their house, and the Wards felt this move was unjust, because they

had made all of their payments. The Occupy movement in Birmingham used this case to

begin the local manifestation of the nationwide Occupy our Homes campaign, which

sought to bring attention to unjust foreclosures by occupying the front lawns of those

attempting to keep their homes. Occupy Birmingham essentially uprooted itself for a

brief period from its financial district Occupation, leaving as little as one person at a time


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to watch over the occupation and continue to address the public, so that as much attention

could be placed squarely on the Occupation of the Ward familys front lawn. In addition,

Occupy Birmingham sought to organize the community around the Wards predicament

and made videos about the plight of the Ward family. This plan succeeded when the

Rachel Maddow Show featured the family and the protestors, which successfully

pressured Bank of America to cancel the foreclosure. As Allyn emphasized, the

Occupation of the Wards family only happened because of the physical presence of the

Occupation in the financial district, and the effectiveness of the physical occupation in

drawing support from many different areas, such as the community and media, to achieve

movement goals.55

In addition to the community-building centered around injustice that

Occupy Birmingham tried to create in the Ward family neighborhood, the Occupy

movement creates community in every physical occupation.

Community

The MST and Occupy Movement both build strong communities within their

occupations. As William Ott, a member of Occupy Birmingham, states, the Birmingham

occupation formed a community full of friends and action that was meaningful. He says

that this unity is a pushback against the balkanization and disconnectedness of our

society. For Ott, real community was not possible before this movement began, and

the occupation is a unique vehicle in bringing together passions and ideas for a different

world. Through the physical occupation, he says, we have found each other and

55Allyn Hudson, phone interview by author, March, 5, 2012.


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through this, solidarity. We are family, he states, community.56

Allyn also agrees that

the occupation provides those that engage with it a sense of community, and he states

that Occupy Birmingham is a community of equals that strive to recognize the diversity

of the people in our community.57

Alicia, of Occupy Eugene, notes that to rebuild

community is one of the principal purposes and goals of the movement.58

It is important

to explain the complexities of community within occupation and how it aids in achieving

a collective identity.

To Alicia, the Occupy encampments are simply showing us that we can dream,

we can say what we want, and we can have a voice of dissent, but until there is a

community guided effort and a stronger work ethic, an ideal community through

encampments cannot be achieved. The community of Occupy Eugene was still dynamic

and, as Alicia claimed, incredible. Like many occupations, it was made up of people

from different backgrounds and places who were all initially strangers to one another, yet

who instantly became neighbors and co-warriors. Alicia also highlighted the feeling of

interconnectedness of the encampment. As a community, one of its most important roles

was to provide as much immediate and long-range care to individuals as possible. Most

importantly, the community was able to rally around and engage in radical democracy.59

Clearly, many occupations have reached the interstitial phase that Aitchison writes

about in which activists create a new society and try to live it out. This can only succeed

56William Ott. Interview by author, Birmingham, AL, January 6, 2012.57Allyn Hudson, email message to author, February 25, 2012.58Alicia, email message to author, March 2, 2012.59Alicia, email message to author, March 2, 2012.


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in combination with strong protest and interaction with the rest of society as a vibrant

community.

Yotam Sawyer expressed this need for protest clearly as he emphasized the

importance of nurturing collective action within the community instead of care. He notes

that the focus on care distracted from collective action, which he regards as the goal of

the movement. A communal structure is also important to Yotam because it helps

individuals move on from their [individualistic] world and enables them to take action

and have clear roles within the movement. Clearly, this sense of community for Occupy

not only brought many out of isolation and provided a vibrant community in which they

could grow, but it also provided the framework for care, collective action and

effectiveness as a social movement. Similarly, the MST needs to develop strong

community for successful collective action in terms of occupation.

Within the Landless Workers Movement, community is initially built in the

acampamentos, or encampments that form as a group of Landless is brought together to

occupy a large farm targeted by the movement for redistribution. As discussed in the

section on participation, the struggle for land attracts most individuals into the movement,

according to Caldeira,60

When the movement occupies farms, the landless create

encampments of black tarps, tough living and precise collective organization that provide

formative experiences.61

Often, like in Occupy Movement encampments, people come

together with different backgrounds, both urban and rural, but must come together

instantly as a community as they face the trials of occupation. Hammond argues that as

60Oziel Fernando, email message to author, February 24, 2012.61Kane, Liam. Popular Education and the Landless Peoples Movement in Brazil

(MST). Studies in the Education of Adults 32, no. 1 (April 2000): 36.


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activists occupy farmland, their isolation forces them an effectively organized

community. As they work to secure a livelihood, political self-defense and education,

activists come together and support each other as a collective.62

Oziel states that the

settlements that emerge from occupation are rehearsals for the realization of an ideal

community, wherein individuals together determine community ideals and live

collectively.63

The ways in which participants of both movements come together to live

collectively and in community helps to create a strong collective identity amongst all.

The creation of community through struggle so drives the MST that this energy

sustains the movement long after the encampments become settlements after the land is

won. Caldeira argues that once individuals have occupied and are firmly part of the

movement, there is a second stage of construction and consolidation of a community of

struggle and resistance. This feeling of struggle and resistance so crucial to the initial

process of occupation is maintained by the movements process of continuing to protest

as a collective, which helps continue the revolutionary experience that has awakened the

individuals consciousness.64

Individuals must continue to struggle for rights to water and

education, as they did when over 18,000 marched on the capital, Brasilia, to demand the

government provide the infrastructure and teaching of high school education for MST

youth.65

62Hammond, John L. Law and Disorder: The Brazilian Landless Farmworkers

Movement.Bulletin of Latin American Research 18, no. 4 (October 1, 1999): 473.63Oziel Fernando, email message to author, February 24, 2012.64Caldeira, Rute. Up-dating Its Strategies and Amplifying Its Frames: The LandlessRural Workers Movement in Brazil and the Displacement of the Struggle for Land.

Perspectives on Global Development and Technology, 7, no. 2 (June 2008): 146.65Grooms, Owen. The Escola Do Campo Joo Sem Terra: A Look Inside the Process ofMaking Education Relevant in the Landless Workers Movement Settlement 25 De

Maio.ISP Collection (April 1, 2011), 17.


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Wendy Wolford asserts that the MST maintains participation of occupiers by

creating an imagined community through ideas and practices and distilled through

slogans and rituals. These processes help to tie members to the movement, even after they

have already won land and become firmly established as small landowners. Thus, they

still see themselves as part of the movement and involve themselves in new occupations,

which continually feed the movement. She writes that the MST creates this community

by presenting poverty as a result of class exploitation, and thus uses boundary framing

to solidify the landless as a collective and the rich as the oppositional class. This helps to

make it possible to identify whom to fight against and whom to fight with, increasing

solidarity and collective identity within the movement.66

In all, the main element of this imagined community is its oppositional class

character. In this narrative, they are landless because those dominant in society stole,

misused, and abused property that should belong to society as a whole. Thus, they must

actively work together to take back what was stolen from the now very clear opposite

class, the landowning elite. In this way, the MST uses Karl Marxs views of the capitalist

system exploiting the worker or soil, and produces a vision of an egalitarian community

where union is strength.67

Both the MST and Occupy movements build community

through intentional processes within their occupations and use action by external

oppositional forces such as police and armed gun thugs, to create demarcations of identity

through boundary framing. This helps greatly in creating a collective identity within both

social movements.

66Wolford, Wendy. Producing Community: The MST and Land Reform Settlements in

BrazilJournal of Agrarian Change, 3, no. 4. (October 2003) 518.67 Ibid, 513-517.


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Collective identity

High levels of participation, inclusivity, and feelings of community combine to

create collective identity, which in turn creates commitment. There are also additional

internal and external forces which help to create collective identities in both movements.

The MST forges collective identity through imagining a new ideal society in social,

political, and economic terms. To realize this identity, the movement must act, however,

and thus must change the economic, cultural, and social situations of those that actively

occupy the land. The MST provides access to basic rights, class-consciousness in

opposition to the dominant landowning elite, proposes a new ideal society, and then

changes the minds and lives of those that commit to the movement. Through these

processes, the MST produces enough unity and common ground for collective identity

formation.

Oziel declared that the MST is an instrument for the realization of the rights of

workers, empowerment, so that the people acquire rights on their own. People are

committed to the movement most of all, because they are committed to taking ownership

of their rights to a good livelihood as individuals, and they feel reciprocating commitment

form the movement. To achieve this, they also have to commit to each other. One MST

occupier stated: Its only together, through union, that well be able to get land, feed our

children, help our friends.68

This feeling of unity helps to cement a collective identity

within the individuals of the movement.

Similarly, Hammond argues that occupation drives individuals to be more fervent

and committed members of the MST He notes that occupations are an ideological

68Branford, Sue and Jan Rocha. Cutting the Wire: The Landless Movement of Brazilin We are Everywhere, edited by Notes from Nowhere, 125.


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hothouse which cultivates members commitment through the intense organization and

collective action necessary for this type of struggle to succeed. Hammond agrees that

joining an occupation in itself shown a high level of commitment because occupiers must

leave behind everything they have to see if their efforts will pay off.69

When I visited an

encampment of the MST, I was astonished by how much individuals said they desired to

occupy and how committed they were to the goals of the movement. One elderly

individual stated that he had worked as a sharecropper for a rich landlord his entire life

and could never escape his virtual slavery until the MST offered him an escape. He was

committed to occupying and enduring the tough conditions because doing so was better

than enduring the wage slavery he had been through his entire life.

Once individuals strongly commit in order to attain their rights, the movement

creates a communal atmosphere, a culture of struggle, and transforms the behavior and

values, and environment of the settlers. What is crucial is the inversion of values that

transforms everything from being individually to collectively owned and maintained.

Thus, people see themselves as a part of one collective very strongly, and thus more

active within, and committed to, the movement. Sue Branford and Jan Rocha note that

occupation is the cornerstone of the movement in which the landless lose their

innocence, become militant activists, and create a new identity for themselves. As MST

leader Joo Pedro Stedile asserts, the vehemence of the act of occupation puts you

firmly in one camp or another, because to occupy, you must have a position, in essence

a strong identity. The act of occupation is thus the fuse for a profound process of

69Hammond, John L. The MST and the Media: Competing Images of the BrazilianLandless Farmworkers Movement. Latin American Politics and Society 46, no. 4(December 1, 2004): 69


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personal and political transformation wherein individuals reject the values of the

establishment and take the step to impose their own agenda and become subjects of

their own history rather than objects.70

There is also a great sense of collective identity

created by outside, oppositional forces. Branford and Rocha describe in detail the

interactions of heavily armed gunmen and the MST occupiers, relating them to runaway

slaves.71

This greatly enforces the boundary framing that the MST itself uses to

differentiate the landless from the elite class.

One way in which the MST brings people together in the occupations and then

afterwards is through the mistica that displays the rich symbology of the movement in a

presentation of flags, songs, chants, theater, poetry, and stirring speeches. Carter states

that the misticas have helped to nourish an intense social energy, forceful convictions,

and [a] strong sense of identity. Furthermore, he notes that he often hears movement

participoants state things such as I love the MST or The movement is my family.72

I In my experience in an assentamento, or settlement, of the MST, the mistica was an

anniversary celebration of the first day of the occupation, which glorified that specific

struggle and the movement in general. It nurtured pride and a sense of identity within the

community. The mistica serves to bring the people together as one during occupation, so

that it is more successful, while in the settlements, the mistica often harkens back to and

glorifies the original occupation as the source of the progress the community has made.

70 Branford, Sue and Jan Rocha. Cutting the Wire: The Landless Movement of Brazil inWe are Everywhere, edited by Notes from Nowhere, 122-3.71

Ibid, 124.

72Carter, Miguel . The Landless Rural Workers Movement (MST) and Democracy in

Brazil.Latin American Research Review. 202.


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Also, the mistica helps to promote this imagined community ideal of unity within the

entire MST because it is put on by militantes, or movement activists, who travel to

different settlements and encampments in order to provide support, a sense of solidarity

within all sectors of the movement and unity in purpose.73

Mistica slogans affirm this

unity and also inclusivity: We are all comrades in the struggle for land, and Land

Reform, a struggle form everyone!74

Within the Occupy movement, collective identity is similarly created within the

physical occupations. According to Alicia, the physical occupations unite people who

have been oppressed their entire lives in various ways and thus the space heightens

individual understanding of injustice in the world. The unification of these minds around

similar injustices helps to create collective identity. Like the MST, the Occupy

Movements collective identity is created in part by boundary framing. Alicia notes the

importance of the oppositional collective identity that is used to differentiate activists

from antagonists. She finds that physical occupations create a central point where the

antagonists, which she describes as police and oppositional cultural forces, can harass

us en masse and thus unite us in our now obvious common oppression. She continues to

say that the suffering caused by this conflict built a sense of standing on common

ground and that the collective identity resulted more form the common antagonism

than from living together in community.75

Alicia very clearly shows how collective

identity and consciousness is formed by the external forces which make up part of the

power structure the Occupy Movement is trying to change.

73

Grooms, Owen. Field Journal, May 27th

, 2011, Madalena, Ceara, Brazil.

74Ibid.75Alicia, email message to author, March 2, 2012.


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Some note that unity was created within the movement as well. Kayvon notes that

being involved in occupations connected him to a large number of people that he

otherwise would not have met, and that it showed him how similar they were before the

occupation began. With the starting point of the occupation as common ground, he began

to look at people without the lens of social status or appearance, and thus was able to

congregate with people from very different backgrounds and form unity and at least some

semblance of a collective identity.76

When Yotam discussed the physical Occupation in DC, he focused on the collective

identity construction of marching through the streets every day and the feeling of

unification that resulted from the combination of this collective action and living

together. This created a high level of commitment, which was evident, since all in the

occupation slept in the open because tents were not allowed. At one point, it rained for

five days in a row, but the level of commitment was so high, that everyone stayed and

endured, even if they were sleeping in puddles. This level of commitment also increased

the size of the encampment. Because other Occupations were shut down, activists from

all over the country, the diehards as he called them, flooded DC, but this increase in

numbers did not compromise the feeling of collective identity felt among all who camped

there.

Though times were tough, he recalled that there was a great deal of lightheartedness

in Occupy DC, and that this was key to the group feeling that was so powerful for him

and all others there. Though this had to do a lot with a lack of external forces that helped

create a collective identity in occupy Eugene, such as harassment by the police, some

76Kayvon Kazemini. email message to author, March 27, 2012.


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internal forces also helped to create this feeling of involvement, commitment, and

identity. Through a series of de-escalation and peacekeeper trainings, everyone was

involved and became peacekeepers. This not only helped to create the common ground

needed for collective identity as occupiers and peacekeepers, but it also helped to

maintain low tensions and the lightheartedness that helped to keep the community strong.

Through daily peacekeeper meetings, these feelings were maintained as everyone had a

chance to participate and everyone was kept informed and up to date on important events.

This experience from Occupy DC illustrates the importance of participation, inclusivity,

and community in the creation of collective identity and commitment.

Conclusion

Both of these movements are inclusive and allow for people to actively participate

and engage in the work of occupation for social change. Occupation allows individuals to

become very involved and committed, integral parts of a community that is actively

seeking change as a collective. The powerful bond of collective action creates an identity

that helps to create more commitment and sustain the movements. These movements also

use deliberate processes to create collective identity, such as the mistica, and the

resistance of elites to their goals in terms of boundary framing in order to solidify

identity. These identities help to create and are created by, the commitment, solidarity,

and empowerment necessary to maintain the energy a dynamic, successful movement

requires. Clearly, social movements across the globe are using occupation as a tool for

social change in order to bring attention to their issues and provide a visible, tangible, and


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enduring force that compels change, while also from the framework of a community that

is strong through committed members and unified by a collective identity.

There is much discussion within the Occupy movement concerning the move

toward a more decentralized and neighborhood-activism approach, such as has occurred

in Spain with great success, as Moreno-Caballud and Sitrin note.77

Indeed, now that many

Occupy encampments have been removed, many have come to question the importance

of occupations within the movement, just as Cardeira raised the point that the MSTs

battles are important out in the field, but that they are becoming less frequent and less

important to the movement as a whole. As individuals analyze life the importance of the

physical occupations, however, they come to find that the aspect of place and community

in the movement was missing. Miki Kashtan notes that because the occupations helped to

remove individuals from isolation and alienation, the destruction of the encampments

turned a group of passionate activists and community builders into a collection of

individuals coming together for meetings that to many no longer seem relevant.78

Carter

would caution the loss of occupation within the MST, as he writes that the act of

occupation and the organizational structure and passion that arises from this is an

important democratizing force in Brazilian society as a whole.79

Clearly, as these social

movements continue to change, a great deal more research is needed to understand their

77Luis Moreno-Caballud and Marina Sitrin, Occupy Wall Street, BeyondEncampments, Yes, November 21, 2011, http://www.yesmagazine.org/people-

power/occupy-wall-street-beyond-encampments78Kashtan, Miki. Sustaining the Occupy Movement, Tikkun, Spring 2012, 26

79Miguel, MST and Democracy.


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new methods and ideas. Additional research is also needed to continue to understand the

role of occupation in these social movements and others.

The commitment necessary to become a physical participant of either of these

movements is intensified upon integration in the strong community one finds amidst

occupation. People are empowered by their ability to remake the power of space through

concrete, collective action. As individuals see themselves as a collective, their

commitment again increases, as does the energy they are willing or able to give towards

the movement. Both of these movements, and the individuals within them, more

effectively better their lives and their societies with occupation as a tool of their social

movements.


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Alicia, email message to author, March 2, 2012.

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Brazilian Land Law.

http://www.planalto.gov.br/publi_04/COLECAO/REFAGR3.HTM#2

Occupy Wall Street Website. http://occupywallst.org/about/Grooms, Owen. Field Journal, May 2011, Madalena, Cear, Brazil.

John Spitzberg. Interview by author, Asheville, NC, March, 24, 2012.

Kayvon Kazemini. email message to author, March 27, 2012.

Oziel Fernando, email message to author, February 24, 2012.Yotam Sawyer. Interview by author, Swannanoa, NC, March 17, 2012.

William Ott. Interview by author, Birmingham, AL, January 6, 2012.

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